The Abilene reflector. [volume] (Abilene, Kan.) 1883-1888, 1887-03-31
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What Bob Burdette Has to Say Aooui
settling Down to Housekeeping.
1t Is indeed pleasant to settle down
to housekeeping again after few
years Of life in every sort of hosiery,
from an open-face camp in the Adirou-
dacks to New York hotel There are
50 many pleasant surprises in store Tor
one, when one takes ones Lares and
Penates, with all the appurtenanees
thereunto sppertaining from the dark
solitude of the gloomy store room IN
which they have passed d few years IN
sentiment and reflection. You think
of so many more things than you say,
as you unpack the barrels OF ham
mered china and crackle ware. All
our china is real hammered and all our
crystal Is the genuine crackle. Some OF
our fragile ware I hammered myself,
some the truckman hammered, and
some was hammered when the cask
fell down the elevator well at the store
room. am fair to middling light
weight packer, but am not genius
Consequently, it never occurred to
me, when 1 packed a bale Of pressed
hay around one tumb,sE, to pace
against the contingency of Is..l OF 81;
stories. But then l never stored &c
fore, and knew not the ways OF the
storage warehouse. / do now. II ever
store OBSERVATION-DISCLOSURES these tears
have now nothing to store. Nothing
save only one stove leg. And it dOesn't
belong to me. 1t got mixed up will
my things in the warehouse But it II
whole; hasn't crack or flaw in 1t, anI
so will keep it have no earthly us'
for it, but it does my soul good to SCI
something whole about the new hous'
beside the ones / made in the wal
hunting for a hidden scantling witt
a hammer and picture nail. found
seabtlino once. Probed for it with
gimlet until got hold of it. Then
went into the next room for a hamme
and picture nail When ! came back
if somebody hadn't moved thai scam
ling am a heather from Nowgong.
haven't time to chase a scanting al
around house. So / drove the nail in
to lath and hung the picture. an
now one picture short in that room
but l plastered the hole in the wall 81
neatly you can't see where it hap
pened.
So many little things turn up as yo'
uncover your long-hidden treasures
1 hear my sister weeping in the mex
room over one of them now. Sh
brings her piteous face into my Lai
and says, in the tone of a woman who
is aweary of life: II have found an
other moth" say: "Why, you foun'
six yesterday; what do you want wit
another?" She goes away wringinl
her hands. 1 suppose she found thi
one to bring the count up to the per
feet number. Why do women-Go,
bless them-go about hunting 70
things they don't want to find?
Only the other day, while 1 wa
writing an lode to Washington" an
was trying to think of a rhyme 70
Ratchet, she called me downstairs
She said: II believe there is somethin
alive in that barrel" said in my nativ
language, which always comes back t.
me in moments of anger: "Aw-w-w-w!
The idiom is untranslatable. Onl
men who have used it knOy
what it means; to all others it is tn
Unknowable / stood on my head il
that barrel to grasp at the straw an
crush her idle fears, and may neve
see the penitentiary if procession G
starveling mice didn't stampede up m
back and jump off my waving legs.
did not come out of that barrel S
hastily as you might suppose. My il
tention was to come out rather abrupt
", but l checked it A nail a foo
long, which ran into my back eightee
inches, helped me to pause. They ha
to knock the other head of the barre
in and let me crawl through that way
am now a teetotaller, but [ had a ma
that day that for staying qualities bes
any meat Ticker" that ever introduce
fallen man to the james iambs. -Robe'
j. Burdette, in Brooklyn Eagle.